I am a Senior Lecturer in the department of Linguistics and English Language, School of Philosophy, Psychology, and Language Sciences at the University of Edinburgh, Scotland. I received my PhD from the University of Tromsø, following a specialist degree at the Department of Theoretical and Applied Linguistics, Moscow State University. Previously I was Lecturer in Language and Linguistics at the University of Ulster, Northern Ireland. I came to Edinburgh in 2013 as Lecturer in Theoretical Phonology.
I am a phonologist whose primary areas of interest concern the nature of phonological features and the division of labour in phonological theory. Recently I have also been working on the interaction between segmental and suprasegmental phonology, particularly on the proper analysis of so-called ‘pitch accent’ systems. My other interests are morphology-phonology interaction (in particular stratal/cyclic models), historical phonology, and historical language contact. In particular, I am interested in the interesting phonological commonalities among the languages of north-western Europe, such as preaspiration, ‘pitch accent’ systems, sonorant pre-occlusion etc. Read more about this project here; a monograph on the subject is currently under contract to Cambridge University Press.
At Edinburgh, I am affiliated to the Phonetics and Phonology, Language Variation and Change, and English Language research groups. I am also an affiliate of the Angus McIntosh Centre for Historical Linguistics.
Most of my work is on Celtic languages — particularly Welsh and Irish, and more recently also Scottish Gaelic (chan eil ach beagan Gàidhlig agam an-dràsta). My PhD thesis provides a comparison of selected aspects of the phonology of two Brythonic Celtic varieties, and a book based on parts of it was published with Edinburgh University Press (read more here). My other particular interest is in Germanic — particularly North Germanic — languages. I have also worked on Slavic and Romance varieties.
My paper on the historical sociolinguistics of North Germanic influence on the Gaelic languages has appeared in a Festschrift for Arne Kruse. Read more about the book here!
In Semester 2 of 2022⁄2023, I am teaching on Historical Phonology, LEL2D: Cross-Linguistic Variation: Limits and Theories, and Dialects of English in Britain and Ireland
I presented a keynote talk on the life cycle of phonological processes in Norwegian at the 19. møte om norsk språk conference, postponed from 2021.
I gave a talk on our work with puzzles in the university linguistics curriculum with Graeme Trousdale and Rob Truswell at the 2022 LAGB conference workshop on Advances and challenges in teaching linguistics at university.
In Semester 1 of 2022⁄2023, I am running the Honours/MSc course Phonological Theory and the pre-Honours on Linguistics and English Language 1A, where I am also responsible for the puzzle component. Furthermore, I am offering a new Honours course called Structure of a Language: in 2022⁄2023, we are exploring the structure of Ukrainian.
My paper on the historical phonology of Sámi preaspiration has appeared in a Festschrift for Trond Trosterud.
Before you ask, anghyflawn is Welsh for ‘incomplete’. I also get asked about my name a lot, so here is a brief explanation.
This website was created with Hugo, on the basis of the great design by Greg Restall.
I’m Pavel Iosad, and I’m a Senior Lecturer in the department of Linguistics and English Language at the University of Edinburgh. ¶ You can always go to the start page to learn more.